Music
Search this list of all my publicly available works using the search box, or the category and year lists. Information about each work includes where to buy, borrow or listen to it.
Hoata
For chamber orchestra
Hoata was written for the Northern Sinfonia, who, conducted by David Haslam, gave the first performance during the 1980 Newcastle Festival.
About the work
I wrote Hoata, named for the Māori phase of the moon when the new moon is barely apparent, while I was living on the Northumbrian moors north of Hexham and while I was composer-in-residence for Northern Arts and a Fellow of Newcastle University. It was a cold winter, and the snow around the small remote cottage, which was not well insulated, lay on the ground for 4 months as blizzard followed blizzard, and something of the isolation and the environment seems to have got into the piece.
Hoata consists of sections built up in a mosaic-like manner, separated by freer sections, which may be cadenzas, or have a degree of improvisation; there is at times perhaps a suggestion of birdsong.
Instrumentation
Hoata is scored for: 121(+bass clarinet)2; 2000; timpani and strings.
Score
Buy or borrow the score, or hire the parts from SOUNZ.
The Tinker’s Curse
Children’s opera for 6 adult soloists, 2 children’s choirs, 10-piece ensemble and 6-piece children’s percussion ensemble
Libretto by Joan Aiken
The Tinker’s Curse was written with a grant from 1YC Telethon Trust for the Year of the Child while I was composer-in-residence for Northern Arts, United Kingdom.
About the work
The Tinker’s Curse was tailored for performance in Cumbria, United Kingdom, involving local schools and musicians. Because of publishing deadlines not being met, the performances were cancelled. The story is particularly appropriate for Northern England or Scotland, but maybe not appropriate elsewhere.
This opera is dedicated to my parents, Marjorie and Ivan Whitehead.
Synopsis
Act 1
A travelling tinker, seeking shelter in a moorland house, is killed for his possessions and his body is thrown in the lake, and his angry ghost, lamenting, promises ill fortune to any who hear his voice.
Many years later a young couple settle in the house. When his wife is in labour, the husband, who wants a son, runs off to fetch the doctor. His wife hears the ghost of the tinker, and when her husband returns, his wife has died in childbirth, but the child, a girl, is alive. The husband refuses to accept the situation.
14 years later, the child, Helen, who has been born deaf, is teased by the local children, and admonished by her father, who considers her useless and lazy. She tries to play with the other children, but it is discovered that she has the ability to find what is lost. She is befriended by Andy, who explains how people should talk to her.
The doctor comes past, and recognises the place where the tragedy took place many years before. Eventually, with Andy’s help, he can talk to Helen, who helps him find his watch, lost 14 years before. The doctor tests her hearing, and says he can give her an operation which will restore her hearing.
Act 2
The second act begins in the hospital, with the nurses and matron. The operation takes place successfully — it’s an operation quite outdated today — and everything is finally resolved back home outside the cottage.
Cast
The cast consists of 6 adult soloists and 2 childrens’ choirs.
Instrumentation
The opera is scored for string and wind quintets with childrens’ percussion (6 players). It can be accompanied by piano.
Score
Buy or borrow the score from SOUNZ.
Tirea
For chamber orchestra
Tirea was commissioned by the Contemporary Baroque Ensemble with funds from the Arts Council of Great Britain, and was written when I was composer-in-residence for Northern Arts in the United Kingdom.
The first performance was given by Sandra Mackay (oboe), Joyce Nixon (violin), Penelope Cliff (cello) and Dan Saunders (harpsichord) with the Contemporary Baroque Ensemble conducted by Alexander Cowdell, at New Zealand House, London on 27 September 1979.
About the work
Tirea is the name for the second day of the Māori lunar calendar. Some technical aspects fo the piece — pitch, texture and rhythm — are derived from the proportions and symmetries of the magic square of the moon, of European or Middle Eastern origin, in which horizontals, verticals and diagonals all add up to the same number.
The overall 3-movement form has something in common with the Brandenburg Concertos in its pitting of a concertino (oboe, harpsichord, violin, cello) against a body of strings, but the detail, although largely canonically conceived, is very different from that of Bach. The first movement is tripartite, with the third section a varied recapitulation of the first. A harpsichord solo leads into the second movement, which makes some use of octave figurations, while the third picks up tempo and energy.
Instrumentation
Tirea is scored for oboe, violin, cello, harpsichord and strings.
Score and recording
Buy or borrow the score, or borrow an archival recording from SOUNZ.
At night the garden was full of voices
For 4 recorders
About the work
This short piece was commissioned for recorder consort by Price Milburn Music at Steve Rosenberg’s request. Steve was a virtuoso recorder player who was active in the revival of the instrument in Auckland in the 1970s. He published a number of books of recorder music and At night the garden was full of voices was included in the second of these.
I was living in London when I wrote this work and finished it on 1 August.
Instrumentation
At night the garden was full of voices can be played by SSAA recorders or TTBB recorders.
Score and recording
This work was published by Price Milburn Music.
Hear and watch a recording from 2017 during a ‘composer portrait’ concert.
Moonstone
For viola and piano
Moonstone was commissioned by Glynne Adams, with funding assistance from the Australasian Performing Right Association (APRA). It is dedicated to Glynne Adams and Janetta McStay. The first performance was probably given by Robert Ashworth and Sarah Watkins in 2021.
About the work
Moonstone was written in London and Orkney around 1976 or 1977.
At that time I was exploring the possibilities of using proportions based on the patterns of magic squares, known since the Middle Ages and even earlier, and associated with the planets, sun and moon. In these squares, a series of consecutive numbers (1-9, 1-16, 1-25, etc) are arrayed to form a solid square in which the vertical, horizontal and diagonals all add up to the same number.
It’s not necessary to know any of this to experience the piece, but the title, as well as being the title of a book by Wilkie Collins, indicates the use of the square of the moon — the numbers 1 to 81. This was the first time I’d experimented with that square, which was also the basis of a number of later pieces such as Moon, Tides and Shoreline and Resurgences.
There are 4 movements. The first and most substantial, can stand alone, while the second is scherzo-like. The third, which again can stand alone, has elements of improvisation — the performers are given 9 boxes, and it’s up to them to determine the order, dynamics and tempi of the fragments. The piece ends when one box is played for the third time.
Score and recording
I’d like to thank Elliot Vaughan for his transcription and editing of a fairly complex handwritten score, and Robert and Sarah for their tremendous dedication to giving the piece life.
Buy or borrow the score from SOUNZ.
A CD including this work can be bought from all good record stores.
Ricercare
For viola
Ricercare was commissioned by Philip Clark with funding from the Queen Elizabeth II Arts Council, and first performed by him at the Maidment Theatre, Auckland in 1976.
About the work
In Ricercare a series of 3 recitatives and arias develop in and out of each other so that there is no clear-cut division between them.
Like much of my music at the time, the pitches, rhythms and section structure are based on proportions based on a magic square — this time the square of Mercury.
Score and recording
Contact me if you are interested in seeing the score.
RNZ Concert recorded Philip Clark’s performance.